In their own words: Who the hell are Bardell Pearce?
According to them, they’re a creative team with one aim; to inspire some real action.
The name Bardell Pearce came from the uber-unique notion that they’re a creative team, one of whom is called Dave Bardell and the other Jason Pearce. And it was born out of an equally ground-breaking chat over a coffee in 2022 where they both realised they weren’t able to be as creative as they wanted to be, and clients were probably losing out because of it. That’s never happened before, right?
A spark was needed to ignite change, and Bardell Pearce was it.
Dave says he’s 29, from London, with 7 kids, and Jason says he’s from Luton, a smidge older at 29.5, and had dinner with Prince Phillip once. And yet they’ve got over 50 years of successful, award winning, collective experience? At least one of them is older than they’re letting on.
During that time, they’ve helped thousands of brands find their spark and cut through the noise to reach their audiences. Being creative, being strategic, and running agencies is what they’ve always done well. But they want to do even better work together.
So, they’ve cut out the faff, dialled up the clarity and honesty to 11, and double-concentrated the good stuff.
They enjoy it, their clients enjoy it. What does that even mean? Well, this is what they say about it:
“Bardell Pearce is the place where your brand stops being ignored, and succeeds.”
“Our role when working with any client is to get them seen, make them relevant to their audience, and inspire their audience to take actual action. Because that’s the creative formula for beating your competition.”
“All our clients offer something genuinely helpful and relevant that serves a real need of their audience. So we make engagement happen and create that cut-through, together. What’s not to love, right?”
Where it all began
Their paths crossed about 18 years back when Jason was co-founder and CD of his previous agency (still going, still successful). It’s unclear whether Jason invited Dave or Dave invited himself to freelance at the agency because he’d heard great things and fancied injecting a bit of the Bardell magic.
This was about 18 years ago, and they’ve worked together on and off overall those years; a partnership that has always seen great results and happy clients. It was in 2018 that Jason decided to leave that agency to take on some new challenges. Jay says of that time:
“I’ll be honest I wasn’t sure whether I’d hung up the markers and mac for good or not, but the phone was ringing from the first day of me being out of the business. I held off for a good 12 months or so until I decided to start again. From scratch. But to be fair, I was always on the look for the right partner and when Dave and I started working together on a rebrand for a Biotech product in San Francisco, we had a great craic and that’s when I asked him whether he fancied the challenge of a new agency start up. And of course, he jumped at the chance.”
Dave has as a slightly different memory of events:
“Oh Yes, jumped at the chance, after three weeks of deliberation. To be honest, I’d been considering what mark I wanted to make for a while, and had tried a few projects, but when Jay suggested joining forces it made perfect sense. We have a great time working together. A lot of belly laughs and that drives some fantastic creative and I think clients can see we’re enjoying working for them – which makes our relationships with our clients a little different. We’re not here to mess about, I mean Jay’s not getting any younger so we get to the point and ultimately deliver creative that actually does something, something worthwhile.”
They’re now two years down the road with a growing client portfolio across varied sectors, which doesn’t surprise Jason:
“I’d often been told when setting up the first agency, ‘you need to specialise in a sector or a service.’ But I’d been at agencies that specialised and any two projects would start looking like each other whatever sector they came from. I’ve always loved the idea of applying creative thinking to any sector and any channel. I’ve been involved in projects that included 3000sq.ft exhibitions for Tech companies in Barcelona, launching home appliance products in Piccadilly Circus underground station, art directed TV ads in Madrid, rebranded both international and local charities who help the planet and people in deprived areas respectively.
And Dave concurs: “I’ve never subscribed to the idea that you need to work in a sector. I don’t think there’s one we haven’t worked in, and no medium is safe either. We don’t have a pre-determined idea of what’s best for a client, we do what works best for their aim, and bring fresh insight every time. That is the beauty of how we apply creative thinking.”
Why the lightning bolt?
Dave has the answer to this.
“Well. We’re about being honest. But that's what everyones ays isn't it? And you can't argue the opposite of it, so it's also a vanilla statement unless you evidence that you’re honest.”
“So I’ll tell you an embarrassing truth. I have our logo as a tattoo. It's about 6 inches long and if you ask me nicely, I’ll show you. But the point is, when I got it, I thought it would be a personal statement about the "inspirational, spontaneous creativity that shapes the life of a creative. Illumination, enlightenment, insight. Woah, dude.”
“Halfway through the tattooing session, one of the other tattooists piped up”.
“Lightning isn’t really spontaneous though is it? There's a lot that has to build up first. It’s not really unexpected.”
“All my dreams of inked originality suddenly dashed against the sweaty wall”
But, as they’ll tell you, she was right. Around the world, lightning is a sign of prosperity, growth, and transformation. Because it comes before the rain and the abundance that follows.
Each strike is unique in unexpected ways, but they’re all impactful, hard to ignore, and illuminating. They’re awe-inspiring.
But, she was right, it’s a myth to think that lightning is an unexpected bolt from the blue; a representation of creative eureka moments. They’re the result of positive attraction building up over time, eventually being released in to the world.
Which handily, is a bit like the real way strategy and creativity interact; revealing a way forward. If done well, the resulting explosion of ideas are powerful, impactful, and hard to ignore. Each strike forms in unexpected directions. Exhilarating. Energising. Resulting in breath-taking displays.
They’re getting a bit carried away with the analogies now. But contrary to popular belief, lightning also often strikes in the same place, more than twice. Some places have 100s a day!
So why do they do it?
As they stated said earlier, it’s what they do and what they do well, according to their clients. And when you do something well and enjoy doing it, then it’s easy to get up and get stuck into the next project and discuss how you can make a difference today.
It’s also exciting to work across industry sectors and fields. “We implement our creative across all media channels and our clients are far and wide, quite literally a two-minute driveaway or in Washington DC,” Jason explains.
“We want to work with good people. Both co-workers who support us in delivering great creative solutions to our clients and clients who want to have a good time working with us to get the best results from everything we deliver.”
We want to do several things that clients so far have found refreshing:
Cut out the faff Get to the point, speak like we speak, cut out marketing BS.
Dial up the clarity Reduce friction, make it simple and seen.
Be honest about stuff Customers know the score, so admit it.
Double-concentrate the good stuff Give ‘em more inspiring creative than they’re used too.
Make smiles Have some fun, give some happiness back too.
Add a bucket of reality Reveal real stuff, and show effectiveness.
Any final words?
David’s first with various words and phrases he likes which include rhubarb, but finally:
“My grandad always lived by the maxim “It’s * * * * - all on a big ship”. He told me he learnt that in the Navy but I found he was never in the Navy and had never even been on a boat even though he wore a captains hat for his last 20 years. It’s always reminded me to never take yourself too seriously. It helps.”
“Never chop firewood in a dinghy”, says Jason.
I think this interview's over.
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